I Want a Hippopotamus For Christmas
by YummySushiToo
Summary: In which Hermione overflows with Christmas Spirit, and Draco soaks some of it up.


**Title:  **I Want a Hippopotamus For Christmas

**Author:  **YummySushiToo (sushi3579@yahoo.com)

**Summary:**  In which Hermione is infused with Christmas Spirit, and Draco soaks some of it up.

**Disclaimer:**  Not mine.  "Really?" you ask.  Yes, really.

**Author's Note:  **The songs quoted are "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas," and "Holly Jolly Christmas."  

            Hermione Granger walked down the hallway toward the library, her steps light and carefree.  She had a slight smile on her face, and she was humming faintly.  Occasionally, she would sing bits and pieces of the song she was humming.  "Don't want a doll, no dinky Tinker Toy, I want a hippopotamus to play with and enjoy…."  Quite simply, she was full of Christmas Spirit, and it showed.

            This hadn't been the case the week before.  Hermione had written her usual weekly letter to her parents, full of news about her classes, her friends, and herself.  This was routine.  However, she also mentioned the lack of Christmas Spirit in everyone around her.  This was disappointing to Hermione, who loved Christmas, so her parents decided to send her an early Christmas gift: a portable CD player with headphones, and a few CDs full of Hermione's favorite Christmas songs.  Hermione had charmed the little player to work without batteries, and she took it everywhere.  So, it was due to this thoughtful gift that she now overflowed with Christmas cheer.

            She walked into the library, giving Madame Pince a happy smile and a wave.  Then, she made her way back to her favorite study table, and pulled out a book and her CD player.  She started one of her CDs, and sat back to read.

            Hermione hummed along with the music, tapping her fingertips softly on her knee.  Sometimes a song lyric would make her giggle – "_Some_body waits for you, kiss 'er once fer me!" – but she was generally quiet.  _I'm in such a good mood, _she thought, _nothing can ruin it._

            Just then, she looked up to see Draco Malfoy making his way over to the same study table she was currently occupying.  She figured he'd make a fuss, but she didn't care.  It was Christmas.  So, when he sat down across and two chairs away from her, she didn't hesitate to say, "Happy Christmas, Draco," and gave him a warm smile.

            Draco looked at Hermione, astonished.  She _had_ just smiled at him and wished him a happy Christmas, right?  He pinched himself on the arm, just to make certain he wasn't asleep in front of the common room fire again.  When it hurt, and he knew he was awake, he hesitantly returned, "You too, Gra – Hermione."

            Hermione was nodding her head in time to the music, which he took for acknowledgement of his greeting.

            They sat in silence for about half an hour, both reading, while Hermione's CD player went through song after song.  Finally, it reached her favorite, a silly song that delighted her to no end.  She hummed along with it, and then sang a line:  "I want a hippopotamus for Christmas, I don't think Santa Claus will mind, do you?"  Then she continued humming.

            Draco looked up, not knowing Hermione was listening to music only she could hear.  He thought it bizarre that she _sang_ her question to him, but he also thought, _What the hell?  It's Christmas._  So he said, "You want a hippo?  I wanted one when I was six.  I was so disappointed when I didn't receive one."

            She didn't respond, so Draco leaned over the table and prodded her arm with his finger.  Hermione looked up, startled.  "What?"

            "_You_ asked _me_ a question.  I merely responded, as is the _polite_ thing to do."  He raised an eyebrow as a flush slowly crept up her cheeks.

            "Oh!  No, Draco.  I was – singing.  It's a song."  She held up the CD player.  "See?"  _Who wants to crawl into a hole and di-ie? _her mind sing-songed.  _Me!  Oh, pick me!_ another part answered.

            Draco looked crestfallen, which Hermione, in the deepest, darkest, spider-infested-so-Ron-won't-go-in-there corners of her mind, thought was cute.  "So – you _don't_ want a hippo for Christmas?"  _And here I thought we had something in _common, he thought.  _Damn._

            "Well, maybe I did once, but that was long ago."

            "Ah.  I see."  He nodded, and then thought for a moment.  He looked as though he was waging an internal battle with himself, over whether or not to continue the conversation with her.

            Hermione waited patiently.  After all, she had the Christmas Spirit and no one to really share it with.  Would it be _so_ bad to share some with Draco Malfoy, who looked like he needed bushels of it?  She thought not.

            Finally, he said, "Well, as I said before, I wanted one when I was six, but Lucius forbade it."  For a moment, he looked lost in some small memory.

            Hermione gazed at him, sad for that long-ago little boy.  She ventured, "So what _did_ you get that year?"

            "My parents were always very practical, socks-and-underpants type people.  Granted, _expensive_ socks and underpants, but socks and underpants nonetheless."  He paused.  "How many times did I just use the phrase 'socks and underpants'?  It seems like quite a bit."

            She laughed.  "At least fifty-three," she teased.

            "Ah.  So, not as many as I thought."  He gave her a genuine smile.

            Hermione felt her heart skip a beat.

            Draco leveled her a mock-serious look.  "And what did Father Christmas bring _you_ as a little girl?"

            Hermione giggled at his deep, booming tone.  "Well, Mum and Dad always gave me clothes and books, and educational toys."

            "Ah-ah-ah."  Draco waggled his finger at her.  "But I specified _Father Christmas,_ not Mummy and Daddy."

            "Well," she began, "you know how your parents were practical in the gift-giving department?"  He nodded.  "Well, mine were too, except that I never believed in Father Christmas, because they didn't let me."

            Draco looked shocked and affronted.  "Didn't let you?  Didn't _let_ you?  What kind of sick, twisted – "

            "Dentists."

            "Right.  _Dentists, _would warp such a lovely child like you, like that?  Don't they know that Father Christmas _actually existed_?"  He huffed, indignant.  "Jerks."  Then, realizing who he was ranting at, "Sorry."

            _Lovely child like you…_.  Hermione's mind kept repeating it like a broken record.  Then, she registered another point.

            "Wait.  Father Christmas _actually existed_?  You're kidding me, right?  Having me on?"

            "Not at all," Draco said, seriously.  "He was a German wizard in the twelfth century who made toys for all of the children in the village he lived in.  The _muggle _children," he clarified.  "He loved all children, but not in any pedophiliac kind of way, mind you."  Hermione sighed.  Only _Draco_ would think to say something like that.  "So, then on Christmas Eve, he would Apparate into their houses, take the appropriate gifts out of this bag he carried, perform an Enlargement charm on them, then Disapparate.  He was really quite clever.  Did that for about sixty years."

            "And no one ever suspected?" she asked, amazed.

            "No.  Like I said, clever.  Like you," he added, offhandedly.

            Hermione blushed, and then whispered, "Thanks."

            They sat there in a not-quite-awkward, not-quite-comfortable silence for a while.

            Draco cleared his throat.  "So, what is that thing you held up to show me that you were singing a song?"

            "This?  This is a CD player."  He looked confused, so she explained, "It's a muggle device for playing prerecorded music that's on these discs, called CDs."  She handed one to him, and he stared, fascinated, at the shiny, iridescent object.

            "You know," he said thoughtfully, "this looks like an ornament that Flitwick might put on the tree in the Great Hall."

            Hermione looked at Draco, turning the CD this way and that in his hands.  "You're absolutely right.  But, that's not the best thing about them."

            "It's not?"

            "No, silly, it's the _music_ that's on them.  Here, I'll show you."  Hermione inserted a different disc into the player, and pressed play.  She tapped it with her wand, and said, "_Sonorous._  Softly, please," so that they both could hear the music without the headphones.

            Draco looked instantly delighted at the music he heard.  He turned to Hermione, an eager, excited look on his face.  "Do you _hear_ that?  It's _amazing._"  He had moved around to her side of the table to better hear the music.  She smiled at his reaction, and he spontaneously hugged her.

            Fortunately for Hermione, Draco did not see the deep blush that stained her cheeks.

            They stayed the whole afternoon, listening to all of Hermione's songs and talking of past Christmases.  When Madame Pince told them it was time to leave, Draco remarked, "I hadn't realized…."  Hermione merely nodded.

            Draco and Hermione gathered up their belongings and headed out into the hallway.  Both were sad, knowing the magic of the afternoon was over.  Tomorrow, it would be business as usual, the standard insults and bickering that always occurred between them.

            Hermione sighed.  She didn't want this to end.  She had finally made a friend out of Draco Malfoy, and it was all because of her overflowing Christmas spirit.  Draco had more to him than just sneers and insults.  She had discovered many more layers, and she wanted to explore them all.  Unfortunately, she knew it wouldn't happen.

            Draco heard Hermione sigh, and suppressed one of his own.  Hermione wasn't so bad, after all.  In fact, she was beginning to be a friend, and bloody Madame Pince had to go and ruin it all by kicking them out of the library.  He felt that he just _had_ to find out all he could about Hermione.  He didn't want this newfound friendship to end.

            Wait – he was Draco Malfoy, wasn't he?  He was used to _making_ things happen, not just sitting idly by.

            "Hermione," he began, "when can we do this again?  How about tomorrow?" he suggested, before she had time to protest.

            She protested anyway.  "But Draco, tomorrow is Christmas.  Don't you want to spend it with your friends?"

            Draco gave her a warm smile.  "I will be, Hermione.  I will be."

**********

            That evening, two owls were sent away from the school on very important missions.  The owls had different destinations, but the letters they carried held almost the same request.

**********

            After lunch on Christmas Day, Hermione hurried to the library, despite the protests of Harry and Ron.  She had brought her CD player and her CDs, which had been added to by her parents' gifts that morning.  She also had a very special package, delivered by Hedwig just moments before.

            Draco was already in the library when she arrived.  "I didn't think you were coming," he said, smiling at her.

            "I was waiting for a special delivery," Hermione said, smiling in return.

            Draco tried very hard not to be consumed by curiosity, but unfortunately… "What were you waiting for?"

            "This."  Hermione pulled a beautifully wrapped, green-and-silver package out of her book bag.  She saw Draco's eyes widen in sheer, boyish delight as she handed him the gift.  "Happy Christmas."

            "Thank you," he whispered, reverently holding the gift in his hands.  "Oh!  I got something for you, too.  It's there, on the table."  When Hermione made no move toward the red-and-gold package on the table, he nudged her with his elbow.  "Go on, please?"

            "I'll open my gift at the same time you open yours, deal?" Hermione asked.  Draco nodded.

            Both gifts were unwrapped in record time.  Then they both began to laugh.

            Hermione held up her gift – a white stuffed hippo with a green bow around its neck – and giggled.  She turned to see Draco holding his gift – a gray stuffed hippo with a red bow around its neck.  He looked at her, eyes sparkling with happiness and a huge grin on his face.  She smiled even wider, knowing _she _was the one to make him so happy.

            And Draco's heart soared, thinking in that moment that Hermione was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

            "How did you know?" Hermione asked, flushed and slightly breathless.

            "I don't know.  I just did."  Draco stepped closer to her.  "But, even though this is a very thoughtful gift, I no longer want a hippopotamus for Christmas."  He took another step closer to Hermione.

            "What do you want?" Hermione whispered.

            Draco took a breath, then softly sang, "I want to kiss Hermione for Christmas…"

            And for once, both Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy got _exactly_ what they wanted for Christmas.

The End


End file.
